Asked several Oneidas to pronounce the name for the Oneida stone. They
gave it as follows:
O-ni-o-ta-aug.
O-ne-u-ta-aug.
O-ne-yo-ta-aug.
The terminal syllable, _aug_, seems to be a local particle, but carries
also with its antecedent _ta_, the idea of life or existence, people or
inhabitants.
Onia is a stone. The meaning clearly is, People of the (or who have
sprung from the) Place of the _Stone_.
Adirondack, Jourdain, pronounces Lod-a-lon-dak, putting l’s for r’s and
a’s. It means a people who eat trees—an expression ironically used for
those who eat bark of trees.
For Cherokees, he gives We-au-dah.
For Delawares, Lu-na-to-gun.
What a mass of fog philologists are fighting with, who mistake, as
the eminent Vater and Adelung have, in some cases done, the different
_names_ of the same tribes of American Indians for different _tribes_.
* * * * *